Liu Shaoqi

Liu Shaoqi was a Chinese communist leader and theorist. He was Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee from 1954 to 1959, First Vice Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party from 1956 to 1966 and Chairman of the People's Republic of China, the head of state, from 1959 to 1968, during which he implemented policies of economic reconstruction in China. For 15 years, Liu held high positions in Chinese leadership, behind only Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai. Although originally considered as a successor to Mao, from 1966 onward, Liu was criticized and then purged by Mao. Liu was arrested and imprisoned in 1967. He was forced out of public life and was labelled the "commander of China's bourgeoisie headquarters", China's foremost "capitalist-roader", and a traitor to the revolution. He died in prison in 1969 due to complication from diabetes. Liu was widely condemned in the years following his death until he was posthumously rehabilitated by Deng Xiaoping's government in 1980. Deng's government granted Liu a national memorial service. Liu was born into a moderately rich peasant family in Huaminglou, Ningxiang, Hunan province, in 1898. He received a modern education, attending Ningxiang Zhusheng Middle School and was recommended to attend a class in Shanghai to prepare for studying in Russia. He joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1921 and participated in the first United Front with the Kuomintang against the warlords. He led the Autumn Harvest Uprising in 1927 and established the Jiangxi Soviet as a base for the CCP. He also developed his own version of Marxism-Leninism, known as Liuism, which emphasized the role of the working class and the party building in the revolution. In 1934, he participated in the Long March, a strategic retreat of the CCP from the KMT's encirclement, and became one of the top leaders of the party. He fought against the Japanese invasion during the Second Sino-Japanese War and the KMT during the Chinese Civil War. He was elected as the Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee in 1954 and became the first Vice Chairman of the CCP in 1956. He was also the head of the State Council, the de facto premier, from 1954 to 1959. He was instrumental in formulating the first Five-Year Plan and the Great Leap Forward, which aimed to transform China into a socialist industrial power. However, he also recognized the flaws and failures of these campaigns and advocated for more pragmatic and moderate policies. He was elected as the Chairman of the PRC in 1959, succeeding Mao Zedong, who became the Chairman of the CCP. He was widely regarded as the second most powerful person in China and the heir apparent to Mao. He continued to promote economic reforms and social development, as well as foreign relations with the Soviet Union and other socialist countries. He also supported the anti-imperialist and anti-colonial movements in the Third World. He was a staunch defender of the party's leadership and the socialist system, and opposed any revisionism or deviation from the Marxist-Leninist principles. He was also a prolific writer and thinker, who contributed to the theory of the primary stage of socialism, the party's role in the dictatorship of the proletariat, the people's democratic dictatorship, the socialist legal system, the mass line, and the socialist culture and morality. He was also a champion of the socialist education movement, which aimed to eradicate the remnants of the old feudal and bourgeois ideology among the people. However, he also faced increasing opposition and criticism from Mao and his supporters, who accused him of being a "capitalist-roader" and a "revisionist traitor". Mao launched the Cultural Revolution in 1966, a mass movement to overthrow the "bourgeois" elements in the party and society, and to restore his own authority and ideology. Liu was denounced as the leader of the "anti-party clique" and the main target of the revolution. He was publicly humiliated, beaten, and tortured by the Red Guards, a radical faction of the youth and students loyal to Mao. He was stripped of all his positions and expelled from the party in 1968. He was imprisoned in Kaifeng, Henan, where he suffered from diabetes, pneumonia, and heart failure. He was denied any medical treatment and died in agony on November 12, 1969. His body was cremated and his ashes were scattered into the Yellow Sea. His wife, Wang Guangmei, and his children were also persecuted and imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution. Liu's death was kept secret for a decade, until Deng Xiaoping's rise to power in the late 1970s. Deng initiated a series of political and economic reforms that reversed many of Mao's policies and restored Liu's reputation. Liu was officially rehabilitated by the CCP in 1980 and given a national memorial service. He was praised as a great Marxist, a great proletarian revolutionary, a statesman, a military strategist, a theoretician, and a loyal follower of Mao. He was also recognized as a victim of the Cultural Revolution and a martyr of the socialist cause. His writings and speeches were republished and studied by the party and the public. He was also honored with statues, monuments, and memorial halls in his hometown and other places. Liu is widely regarded as one of the most influential and controversial figures of the 20th century. He is revered by many Chinese people as a great leader, a national hero, and a founding father of the PRC. He is also criticized by some others as a bureaucrat, a pragmatist, and a collaborator of Mao's policies. His legacy is still debated and contested in China and around the world.